The fork lift vehicle is well known. It is a vehicle that can be driven from place to place and carries at its front end two parallel forks. The forks are primarily adapted to slide under a pallet containing heavy materials to be shifted from place to place. The fork lift slides under the pallet, lifts that pallet and materials, transports those materials to the desired place, lowers the materials and slides out from under the pallet.
The fork lift thus described has no capability of extending to a position spaced from the vehicle. Illustrative of the need for extending the capability are military applications. In times of combat, for example, containers carrying ammunition and other supplies are deposited out in the field where the military action is taking place. The terrain may be rough and hilly. There is a need to reach about twenty to twenty-four feet into the containers to quickly pick up the supplies and deposit them out of the container for further handling and use. Some supplies are palletized and are lifted by parallel forks that slide underneath the pallets in a well known manner. Other supplies have bars or the like over the top of the supplies and must be picked up from the top. Rocket launcher pods (Multiple Launch Rocket System) are in this category.
To satisfy these needs, a Variable Reach Rough Terrain Fork Lift Vehicle has been constructed and used. The vehicle has a frame that is mounted on two axles that carry four wheels. An extendable boom is pivoted at its rear end over the rear portion of the vehicle. Two hydraulic actuators are connected at one end to the boom and at the other end to the frame between the two axles.
The boom has two extensions and two hydraulic actuators to operate the two extensions. At the end of the innermost boom is a carriage that has parallel forks. Light-duty forks capable of reaching far into the container are normally mounted on the end of the boom, but these can be replaced with a heavy-duty carriage for lifting very heavy weights such as a ten thousand pound communication module where no substantial reaching into the container is required.
An overhead jib attachment for the MLRS is provided. It is carried in sections. These sections are connected together and mounted on the fork carriage. The fork carriage is shiftable and tiltable for its normal operations and by mounting the jib on it, the jib becomes shiftable and tiltable in order to reach into a container, be it positioned on the ground or on a flat bed trailer or the like, to reach the MLRS.